Report 2022-102 Recommendation 14 Responses

Report 2022-102: California Department of Public Health: It Has Missed Opportunities to Collect and Report Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Data (Release Date: April 2023)

Recommendation #14 To: Public Health, Department of

Public Health should work with local health jurisdictions and the future vendor of the new surveillance system by October 2023 to ensure that the system will be able to receive SOGI data from local health jurisdictions, and be able to extract and report SOGI data for all reportable disease conditions.

6-Month Agency Response

CID has included functional requirements (listed below) for the new surveillance system to receive SOGI data collected from local health jurisdictions and for the extraction and reporting of SOGI data for all reportable disease conditions. As part of the project process, there will be a "requirements traceability matrix", as well as an independent verification and validation process to ensure project requirements and objectives are met once a contract is executed with a vendor. The initial phase of the procurement for FDSS has begun. The full replacement of the surveillance system will not occur unless additional funding is secured for the FY24-25 year and beyond.

Additional functional requirements for new surveillance system:

o The Master Person Index (MPI) must capture sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI).

o The MPI must allow users to view the history of sexual orientation and gender identity, which may change over time, for an individual.

o The system must provide functions to enable "versioning" of individuals in the MPI, whereby unique demographic data for an individual (e.g., names, addresses, SOGI) is stored in the system and associated with a specific time period.

o The system must provide a user interface that allows users to map and populate any data from an incoming Health Level 7 message (including future reporting requirements for SOGI information) to incident or patient records in FDSS, customizable by disease.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 6-Month Status: Pending

60-Day Agency Response

The Center for Infectious Diseases has included functional requirements (listed below) for the new surveillance system to receive SOGI data collected from local health jurisdictions and for the extraction and reporting of SOGI data for all reportable disease conditions. As part of the project process, there will be a requirements traceability matrix as well as independent verification and validation (IV&V) to ensure project requirements and objectives are met once a contract is executed with a vendor.

1. The Master Person Index (MPI) must capture SOGI.

2. The MPI must allow users to view the history of SOGI, which may change over time, for an individual.

3. The system must provide functions to enable "versioning" of individuals in the MPI, whereby unique demographic data for an individual (e.g., names, addresses, SOGI) is stored in the system and associated with a specific time period.

4. The system must provide a user interface that allows users to map and populate any data from an incoming Health Level 7 message (including future reporting requirements for SOGI information) to incident or patient records in Future Disease Surveillance System, customizable by disease.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 60-Day Status: Pending

We look forward to reviewing Public Health's progress towards implementing this recommendation.

All Recommendations in 2022-102

Agency responses received are posted verbatim.